Zhu Xiaoming [R, front], mayor of Zhenjiang City gives a speech at the cornerstone laying ceremony. Local government launched a new ecological pilot district on Dec. 28 in Zhenjiang City, Jiangsu Province. The area, named "Spring Blossom Island," is the first phase of the Zhenjiang Neo-Ecological City (also known as Zhenjiang Eco-District Pilot). Covering 11.1 square kilometers in total, the district consists of 3.8 square kilometers of construction land and 7.3 square kilometers of ecological land. The ecological city will cover 220 square kilometers and have a population of one million.

According to the city's chief planner, Professor Zhou Muzhi of Tokyo Keizai University, the new city will apply modular city planning theory to solve the common problems that cities around the world face and create a new type of city that is livable, productive, and environmentally sustainable. [China.org.cn]